Her Greatest Journey
by JonoGwood
Summary: Rey's secluded life on Jakku changes when an ex-Stormtrooper named Finn comes into her life. As they embark on a quest to defeat the First Order, Rey's greatest journey begins. (Slightly altered from the film, but maintains the general storyline.)
1. Chapter 1

Jakku's environment was unforgiving. Wherever one went, grit and sand danced around aimlessly, sometimes even lashing at one's face if it felt like it. Since Jakku was an arid and sandy landscape, it was quite simply, and obviously, impossible to grow crops. There were some imported foods, but they usually became scarce within a few days of arrival.

Despite all these challenges, Rey found a way to survive. She continued on despite the heartbreak and unspeakable pain of her own family abandoning her at age five. Dependent on no-one, she took matters into her tiny hands and forged a lifestyle for herself, growing up much too quickly as she navigated harsh terrain and haggled greedy shopkeepers on food prices. There were days, yes, when her grief became unbearable and she would sit in her makeshift home and cry until there were no tears left to expel. Things were made worse by the fact that she had no friends to speak of, which compounded her loneliness.

She carried on, to her credit. There was no hope of ever seeing her parents and siblings together. As much as that hurt, she had to press on and survive on Jakku as best she could. The desert did not intimidate her. She had grown into a resourceful, ingenious and strong (both mentally and physically) young woman.

Simply put, Rey was a self-made woman. She was fiercely ndependent and determined to succeed in a hostile environment. Even though she was happy to remain on Jakku, she would sometimes turn her thoughts to other planets and worlds. She tried to imagine lush, green landscapes of a far-off planet, with rushing rivers and birds happily chirping in the trees. If she concentrated, she would imagine villages with the sounds of a bustling and vibrant society. Laughter. Crying. Expressions of surprise and alarm.

Tragically and inevitably, her thoughts turned back to reality. Sighing, she'd begin to busy herself with what needed doing at that moment.

Her taste of other worlds would come sooner than she expected.


	2. Nightmares

A klaxon began a deafening blast throughout the Starkiller Base. To all Stormtroopers, this signified only one thing: an interplanetary attack. One of these, FN-2187, sighed to himself as he made his way to the base armoury. _More innocents slaughtered in the name of the First Order_ , he thought grimly. He was thoroughly sick of having to do "jobs", as the Stormtroopers called them. The term made him recoil; it was as if killing was a routine operation. It was, to his chagrin. Most of his colleagues had hardened hearts, and so were quite happy to obey the orders of their commander to kill.

FN-2187 had, admittedly, killed in the name of evil. At the time he did so because he was told to. Stormtrooper convention stated that it was grossly improper to defy orders from authority.

He would wake at night trembling from his scarily vivid dreams.

A child screaming as its mother was killed by a laser blast. Bodies strewn around the planet. The sickly smell of death. The endless sea of blood.

It all haunted his mind. This was why he wanted to defect from the First Order. To spare himself from the continuous and torturuous exploits. To spare himself from witnessing horror, murder and violence.

To be free.

"Get going!" shouted the commander impatiently.

FN-2187 started for the ship that would transport him to scenes he would not soon forget. He closed his eyes briefly and mentally made an apology for what he was going to do.

* * *

Rey awoke from yet another nightmare of familial abandonment. Her desperate plea as her brothers, sisters and parents hastily boarded a spacecraft. No words of encouragement. Nothing.

Just a deafening roar of engines and then complete, shattering silence.

Five-year-old Rey was alone, vulnerable and utterly inconsolable.

She snapped out of her thoughts and began to start preparing for breakfast. Even as she did so, she continued to be plagued by the horrible memories at the back of her mind.

 _Alone_. The word spun around her head wildly, colliding with her emotions violently. She fought back tears as she started the stove. Her cruel mind was torturing her yet again.

She narrowed her eyes, determined not to let the past dictate her present and future. Her mind's grip on her faded as she sat down to eat. Try as she might, the word _alone_ still lingered in her mind, taunting her as she chewed bacon.

Rey tried to concentrate on her idea of the lush, green planet with the quaint little village again, but her attempts were thwarted by that word again.

 _Come on. Green fields of untamed grass. Straw huts._

 _Alone._

 _No! Children playing in the outskirts of the village. Steam rising from the cooking of meat. Fertile fields..._

 _Your family abandoned you. They never wanted you._

Rey stormed outside, clamouring for fresh air to clear her clouded and fragile state of mind.

She wanted freedom, freedom from the monotony of scrounging for ship parts. Freedom from the bland desert landscape.

Her time would come. For now, it was an arduous wait and she had to keep living.

One fateful night, her circumstances would change dramatically. Her freedom would be granted.


	3. Descent

"Approaching Keelu in T-minus 120 seconds."

FN-2187 inaudibly winced at the pilot's announcement. _2 minutes til slaughter_ , he thought. His thoughts wandered to darker, more violent places as he contemplated what would happen in two minutes' time. He didn't have to think. His memory told him what would happen when the ship's door opened. _Fire immediately. Only pause to reload. The higher the body count, the weaker the chance of resistance._ He almost shuddered as he recalled the stormtrooper trainer's instructions. So Spartan-like, but FN-2187 had to admit the last point was true. The truth broke him. Each kill, murder, whatever it was, broke him.

He had to remain calm. He closed his eyes for the fourth time since he'd boarded the ship and inhaled deeply. Peace seeped into his mind gently at first. Bitter memories tried to oppose it, but it was futile. FN-2187's mind slowly calmed down with each breath. Guilt would have to come later.

As he opened his eyes again, the ship began to tilt. Before he knew what was happening, he slammed into the wall in front of him, striking a colleague standing in front of it.

The announcement system was frantic. "Mayday! Foreign object collision!" it squawked. "Repeat, foreign object collision!"

FN-2187 struggled to his feet. His colleague remained on the ground, unconscious.

"Foreign... foreign object?" he questioned. Unusual. The starfields the ship travelled on were usually cleared for flying beforehand by authorities. He'd had no reason to believe they might be incorrect.

He felt his stomach drop suddenly as the ship began to drop down. Everyone shrieked in horror as the ship descended rapidly.

 _"WE'RE GOING DOWN!"_ the announcement system blasted. _"INSTRUMENTS FAILED. REMAIN CALM."_

FN-2187 backed into a corner and shuddered. He was going to die. His guilt would lead him to the grave. If he was lucky it'd be a quick end.

He closed his eyes and waited for the end to come greeting him.

* * *

Rey was scavenging for AT-AT parts when she heard it. It was a colossal boom that caused her to fall to her knees and give a yelp.

The vibrations subsided, leaving her to get up and remove the excess dust on her clothes. She peered into the distance and noticed what looked like an enemy spacecraft in the distance.

Her curiosity got the better of her. Logic screamed at her to run, but her adventurous side told her to walk forward. This she did, and after a few minutes she came to the visibly battered ship.

Its engines had cut on impact, leaving it to rest on the desert sand. Rey could see the pilot's window. The pilot lay slumped on the controls. Unfortunately, it looked like he had died when the ship had collided.

She went round the sides, carefully inspecting its exterior for any door handles. It could allow her to rescue people trapped inside. It may have been an enemy ship, but Rey was compassionate by nature, and a person trapped was a person that she needed to save.

As she passed one of the sides, a banging noise startled her. It was coming from one of the side doors. She found the door handle and cautiously opened it.

A lone Stormtrooper fell face down, unable to secure footing.

Rey helped him up. "Are you okay?" she asked.

"I... I think so," FN-2187 replied, somewhat groggily.

"Should I remove your helmet?" she offered. He nodded, wanting to see his saviour's face.

The helmet was removed after a bit of fiddling. FN-2187's eyes focused on his saviour and he was temporarily stunned by what he saw.

His saviour was a woman. Her figure was comfortably slender, her eyes were a brilliant, mesmerising shade of hazel, and her brown hair was rather short, yet graceful.

"Thank you, ma'am," he smiled.

Rey stifled a laugh. "There's no need to call me that. My name's Rey. I've lived on this planet, Jakku, for all of my life. And what is your name, if I may ask?"

He hesitated. "My-my name was FN-2187. I don't really want to be called that anymore. I detest working for the First Order. All this senseless bloodshed!" He grimaced. "I've seen things you couldn't even begin to understand, Rey."

Rey felt her heart crumble. This Stormtrooper, she realised, wanted to eschew evil for good.

"How about Finn?" he finally asked.

Rey shook hands with the newly-christened Finn. "Welcome to Jakku," she smiled. "I'm afraid we don't have quite a lot of sights to see," she laughed.

Finn was grateful to go to shelter to escape the sweltering heat. He also was grateful for Rey rescuing him. In the process of walking to her house, Finn threw the Stormtrooper helmet to the ground.

"I won't be needing this anymore," he muttered.


	4. Old Wounds and New Comforts

**AN: Thanks for all the reviews, favourites and follows. I was gobsmacked to find out my story made it into a Star Wars community! It does mean a lot. I'm humbled by all your responses.  
**

 **On with the story!**

Finn let himself be guided by Rey's smooth hand as she took him to the decaying remains of an AT-AT, which she called her house. It was a crude dwelling, with essential amenities added to contribute to a homely feel. About as homely as one could get on a barren planet, in any case.

"So... you live here by yourself?" Finn questioned.

Rey felt the pit of her stomach drop into an invisible abyss.

"Yes," she nearly choked out. She hated feeling so vulnerable, especially to a stranger. Awful memories surfaced. She remembered how alone she felt on that terrible, life-changing day.

"Are... are you okay?" Finn gently prodded. His face softened a little in sympathy.

Rey clenched her fists. "I'm... I'm just remembering."

Finn dearly wished he hadn't asked her about living alone. He winced at his own foolishness.

"I'm sorry."

"No, it's not your fault," she swallowed as her thoughts shifted to the present. "My family left me when I was five years old. I never forgot it."

Finn felt something bubble up inside him. He felt like holding her hand. _I've only just met her! She'll think I'm making unwanted advances. Well, it'll be improper!_

Rey began to sob. Her strong self was crumbling to reveal her inner, broken little girl she'd always been.

This time, Finn really did hold her hand, and she didn't protest.

He didn't know what to say. Stormtroopers were solitary when they were left to themselves. They weren't sympathetic.

But he defected from the Dark Side because he had a sliver of humanity left. He just held her while she wept. It seemed like the right thing to do.

"I'm making a scene," Rey flushed.

"No... it's OK..." Finn soothed. "Sometimes you have to let your emotions out."

She looked up at him. "You really weren't suited to being a Stormtrooper, were you?" she smiled, albeit a little weakly as tears threatened to spill down her cheeks.

"I guess you could say that," he chuckled. He never let her go until her sobs ceased.


	5. Restless Sleep and a Resolution

**Author's Note: My apologies, dear readers, for being late. I was struggling to come up with ideas for another chapter, but thanks to some guidance I was able to write once again. Without further ado, here it is!**

In due time, Rey had taken upon herself the task of providing Finn with shelter and whatever food she could scrounge up. Curiously, she was not burdened with her humanitarian task. In fact, she approached it with an air of genial humility. The environment of Jakku was naturally hostile, but it did not matter for the moment. Her main priority was to help this lost, confused, possibly still disoriented stranger.

Presently, she saw him convulsing violently in the crude bed she had prepared for him. A pained expression had taken over his features. As she watched, his writhing worsened. Alarmed, Rey sprang into action and awoke him from his restless slumber.

Finn's eyes shot open. His squirming died down gradually after his brain registered where he was. Calm washed over his complexion. His breathing resumed normally, and as it did so he looked at the woman who had mercifully, miraculously, saved him from further mental torture and degradation.

"Finn..." she breathed. "You were struggling from the clutches of an awful nightmare. I'm sorry it troubled you."

He nodded. Although the writhing had for the moment ceased, his body was shaking as it tried to remove the unpleasant effects that his nightmare had produced.

"You had no control over it, Rey," he returned with some effort. "It was a terrible dream. Monstrous. It appeared to me suddenly, and I could not turn it off. It replayed the time..."

His body began shaking with more vigour than before. Rey rushed to his side.

"Finn, you don't have to tell me about the nightmare," she countered. "Let your body recover."

"No... I must tell it. It deserves to be told. I need to release this into the open, where it can escape and run away to some hole and never return."

Rey looked at him, at once admiring his bravery and questioning what effect this would have, either positive or negatively. She thought that, eventually, it would surface. The opportunity presented itself. She saw it fit, then, for Finn to disclose his most troubling dream.

"Go on, Finn. I'm listening."

* * *

 _Crunch._

Eight-year-old Finn started at the troubling noise. Seconds earlier he had been peacefully adrift on a boat in some vast, sparkling ocean. The infernal noise had disrupted his voyage.

He rushed to the window of his bedroom.

 _Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.  
_

His veins became rectangular glaciers. Blood flow temporarily halted. Stormtroopers!

In his discourse with friends from his village, he had heard about soldiers dressed in white and sporting weapons - Stormtroopers, they were called - snatching young children and brutally recruiting them into the First Order army.

Tears escaped his eyes as he realised his fate. He tried to get to his mother and father before he would be dragged out of the door. To exchange goodbyes.

 _BANG!_

It was too late; the door to his flat had been blown open by what were undoubtedly Stormtroopers. He prepared to fight them, as he would not let an enemy attempt to get him to submit to their authority without a struggle.

Three Stormtroopers hence ran into his bedroom, guns drawn at the ready. They lined the wall opposite him, preventing any chance of futile escape.

A synthesised voice emanated from the first Stormtrooper. "You belong to us, child. You will obey the commands of the First Order now. When your conversion is complete, you will be sent to the battlefields."

He shut his eyes. "Take me," he cried.

Finn felt pressure on both arms as he was forcibly taken from his room and lead out the door of the flat. Dusty, gravelly roads unceremoniously greeted his bare feet. Harsh, unforgiving stones burrowed into the flesh, prompting him to cry out.

"Pain must be endured from here on in," the synthesised voice buzzed. "You must show no emotion. No reaction." The owner of the voice struck Finn down with the end of his weapon.

"No emotion." The blow came again. "No emotion!"

Finn's screams reached a fever pitch. His agonising wails pierced the air and vibrated for quite a distance along the village. No-one came to his aid.

* * *

Finn completed his narrative, tears welling in his eyes. Rey's vocal chords seized, rendering her incapable of speech at present.

"From that point," he sobbed, "I was indoctrinated into the regime. You have no idea how much your rescue means to me, Rey."

Sensing his gratitude, Rey felt overcome with rage against an unseen enemy. His tragic story highlighted a need for action. The First Order had to be demolished by any means necessary.

"Finn... I might be able to help bring down the First Order."

His tortured eyes sparkled. "How?" he asked.

"I've been searching for Luke Skywalker. He is a renowned figure throughout Jakku. He, along with others, one named Solo, I remember, helped to overthrow a similar regime called the Empire. He can help us, Finn."

Finn couldn't believe his luck. He sensed a new age of freedom was emerging from underneath the First Order's grounds. The forces of good would swallow them up.

He thrust a hand out to Rey.

"To the destruction of the First Order," he smiled.

"To the destruction of the First Order," Rey replied, shaking it.


End file.
